DOCUMENT RESUME

ED 150'591 . 'CS ?03.901 .

AUTHOR.

; Chrey, James W.;, Sims, NormanTITLE --- The Tgaregraph and,the News #eport.PUB DATE 76 ' ' PV 9.

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-_, NOTE 37p.; Paper presented at the Annual Meeting pf theAssociation' for Education in Journalism (59t,'College Park, Maryland, August 1976) .

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EDRS PRICE MF-$O.83 1C-$2.06 Pips Postage..DESCRIPTORS COmposition (Literary); *Ezpositdry Writing; History;

*Literary Styles; Media Technology *New Journalism;

JNews Media; *News Reporting; *News Writing; PressOpinion I

ABSTRACTThis paper deperibes an episode in the history of

journalism that reveals a continuing tension in news reporting.Datim fro* the invention of the telegraph in the late nineteenthcentury, news reports have been increasingly patterned after either a"scientific:" or'a "literary" model. The scientific report is based onirreducible facts, high-speed national communication networks, theprotesSiOnalization of the jourlist, and an integrated socialfoundation for the newsfaper.' The literary perspective is a moreconservative approach to news Writing, based on the integrity of -

feelings, personal observations, interpretationi, and opinions, withan essentially local and indivi4ualistic organization of society.

reached, aew schOlars, such as Robert Ez ark an John Dewey,Although no resolution to the conflicting perspectives s has been .

lattempted to find a balance between the two perspectives. The debatecontinues today, in similar terns, between proponents of newjournalism and preclsion journalism. A bibliographT'is included.(Author/RL)

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4**************************4************!****************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the hest'ltat can be made *

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ilrire "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THISMATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY

James W: Carey

'Norman -Sims

TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES"iNFORm{TION CENTER 1ERILI ANDUSERS OF THE ERIC SYSTEM

O

THE TELEGRAPH AND THE NEWS REPORT

James N. Carey * and Norman Sims**

U S DEPARTMENT OF HEALTHEdUCATION &WELFARENATIONAL INSTITUTE OF

E,DUCAT ION

3 THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN REPRQDUCED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED FROM.THE PERSON OR ORGANIZATION ORIGINATING IT POINTS OF VIEW OR OPINIONSSTATED DO NOT NECESSARi)..Y REPRE-SENT OFFICIAL NATIONAL INSTITUTE OFEDUCATION POSITION OR POLICY.

-)Looking back over his life from 1907, Henry Adams ofiXed tiSe precise moment

C7`/when the United States entered the modern world,the instant of the shift from

!-CNthe Old universe of genteel New England to that of industrial America, in 1844:

0 "the opening of the Boston and Albany Railroad; the appearance of the first

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Cunard steamers in the bay; and the telegraPhic message which carrielkfrom Bal-

timore to washington the news. that Venry Clay and James. K. Polk were nominated

for the Presidency.' The points of departure Adams chose to mark the old from,/

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the new universe tere, significantly, thiee changes in copmunications techtiology.

Th4 last event, the innovation of the telegraph, Tac-stand-metaphorically

for all the innovations which ushered in the modern phase'of history and whicp

has determined, even to this day, the major lines of developmentof Aketican com-.

munication. First, it allowed for the first time for the separation of communi-

.cation from transportation. While this fact was immediately recognized,.the

significance of it rarely has been investigated., The telegraph not only allowed

messages to be separate from "w Physical movement of objects, It also allowed

communication to actively controlpfl*si5.al proCesses. The early use of the tele-.

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.graph in railroad signalling is an example. telegraphic messages could/Ontrol

4the physicalswitAing of rolling sbock-thereby multiplying the purposes and ef-

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fectiveness of communication. The separation }of communication from transporta-

tion has been exploited in most subseqUent developments in communication down to

present day computer control systems.

Secondly, the televaph brought a'change in the natures of reporting, of

knowledge, of the-very structures of awareness. While the. telegroph in its

*James W. *Carey is Director of the Institute of*CommuUniversity of Illinois, Urbana. In late 'August he wthe University of Iowa.

(,) * *Norman Simsteaches in Ike Department Of JournalismUrbana, and is also a member orthe research institute.

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ica ions Research at the11 join the faculty at

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University of Illinois,.

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early dap was used as h toyike the computer which it prefigUres, for the play-,

ing of long distance chess--its implications for human knOwledge were the subject_

of.eftended, often euphoric and often pessimistic debate. Adams saw the telegraph

as the demonic device ilissipItinghe energy'of,history and displacils the Virgin

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by the Dynamo, while Thoreay saw it as an anent of triviOizttion. It will bring

us.the news, he paid,4that "Princess Adelaide has the whooping cough." An even'

la5ger group saw the telegraph as an agency of'benign'improvement, spiritual, moral,

economic and political. now that thought could travel by "the singing.wire" a new

form of reporting and a ney 'form of knowledge was envisioned that would replace

traditional literature with a new and active form of scientific knowledge.

Reporters have quickly recognized in the last decade the conflict between

"precision" journalismnd t10 "new" or- ''romantic" journalism. The fact that this

debatelirst surfaced in the Progressive Era along with the recognition of'the ef-

fecApcof the telegraph unfortunately has been obscured or forgotten in the passage

ofiyears. Even more obscured..is the relationship of/cepOrting as an activity toI

technology and social organization. But te conflict touched off by,thq telegraph--

capaulized hereunder the terms "literary' and "scientific" reporting--is indeed

an old debate. The seeds of the "precision" versus "romantic" reporting contro-

versy were sown with the crackling electric impulses on

The technology of the telegraph-and the history of

connected in ways that are welt known. For the purpose

Nis irfocus on the neglected argument which4the telegraph set

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the telegiaph."wires.

Amer ican newspapers are

of this 'paper, we will

off about the nature of

journalism, of ney6 and the newspaperman, and about the social organization of

the'newspress that remains with us, even if in altered form1/4until this day. This

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argument, traced but herekit some length, reVeals.some of the persistent dilemmas

of modern.journalism and the intellectual strategies used to cope with them.

The effects ofthe telegraph were first clearly understood as early as' the

defression of-1873. Recognition of the changes in journalism and communication

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fostered by the telegraph brought with it two differingrespons64. One branch

,of thoght we have labeled "scientific" reporting. Scientific Teporting was a

1vision for a future organization of society based on the new dynamics centered

around the telegraph. The news report of the future would supercede the litera-

ture, and the literary consciousness, of the past. It was to.he tied to an ir-

reducible, statistical order of facts documenting the state/of the social orga- .

nism. A new, professional role was expected to emerge for the reporter. As

"diurnal man," the reporter would occupy a critical position in the social order

midway between scholars and the public. Finally, the newspaper itself would be

setupon a new foundation. The hopes and aspirations of the scientific attitude

rested on the possibilities of a new form of social intelligence, achieved

through the workings. of the newspaper, which could establish,au integrated'

"republic and an ordered social life.

Arrayed in opposition to this vision was"the more conservative "literary"

apprOach to reporting. This view insisted on the integrity of feelifts, personal

observations, interpretations and4inions, and an essentially local and individu-

alistic organizationyof s iety. For this group,

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the telegraph represented not

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only a threat to the revere forms of social organization and literature, it.

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offered a vision of man thr mentally off balance. The speed and excitement

of the electronic tedium led many to believe it the cause of a destabilizing ner-. - ----.

vous disease. FrOM the literary vtew, the Ideal reporter was.seen as "vernacdler

ran," linked to a local,public rather -than vr national elites. The literary per-

spective also envisioned the newspaper,as a democratic organ. But its democratic'

characterwoUfC. come,from cohmunity association, not from its integrating posi-

tion in a national soctety. L

These 'differences werenotTerely matters of writing style. The argument

could not be 4esolved by applying a scienyific style of writing to particular.A

set of reports and a literary style el'seWhere wheu it seemed appropriate., The:

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'argument wall founded. on higher ground. At heart was the question of what wad

worth knowing, and, secondarily, where the-itieitific'or literary reports Of

experience might lead. More than mere technique in writing was at stake; the

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ability of the telegraph to ,alter forms of thought,and 04 nature of'community

life was debated as 41. threat and a promise:

We have chOsen to represent the scientific View of journalism by Franklint

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Ford, an ecqnomic-journalist who wrote several theoretical tracts at the turn of

the centuty outlining a vision of journalism in the future. Forges writings in-

,troduced a temper of tilkught that had a vast and direct influence on the only

gnoup,of American scholars to take the flewspaper sefiously, the Chicago School

of Social Thought. Theliterary view of reporting will be. illustrated Are by

drawing upon the York of medical researcher George Miller Beard, and by journalist

and author Charles Dudley Warner. In aconcludIng section, we will follow the

debate as it took'shape in scholarly writing in the twentieth century.,0 .

The Scientific Report

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The goal pf certain progressive thinkers was not merely the transformatidn

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of journalism into in efficient, xpert, managed enterprise. They wanted.the

.transformation to reach beyond the surface techniques of reporting til, the spirt-7.,. .

tual core.%

of society itself, in which case journalism would become'the dgent of 7...,,I,'

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a renewed and integrated modern community: In the 1890's an innovative New York

Aournalist named Franklin Ford developed just such a.'ision or a',;Inew sense of

'flews." Ford hiiself is an obstUre and fotgotten persons He Would be unknown

''--rOdiibViCor the direct and significant influence of his'ideas onkthe Chicago

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Schoolvof Social Thought; and' particularly on John Dewey.

, In Outlines of a Critical Theory of Ethics Dewey expressed his debt to his, m L- 1

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4 1 O'''J. .frtend Franklin Ford for the treatment of the social bearings of 'cience and art.

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qn a clarifyipg letter to William James, Dewey fufthe this indebtedneeir

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Ford, whomas'amewspatiler map (forie0y editor of Bradstreet'sin New York) with no prey/Ong philosophica]f training had been ledby his newspaper experience to study as..a practical question thesocial bearings of intelligence and, its.distribution. That is tosay" he was on a paper and wanted to'inquire. The paper wouldnot let 'him: the more-he was stopped; the more his° desire toinquire was aroused,until finally he was drawn into a study ofthe whole matter; - especially as he found thit it was not any, one

newspaper; but raEher the social. structure, which prevented free-dom of in4uiry. Well, he,identifled the question of inquiry

1with, in philorlophical terms, the questiOn of the relation Ofintelligence to the'Objective world - -is the former free to movein relation to the, latter or note So htudied plat the Yolld4-ing questions: (1) the conditions and effects of tie dietribu-ti3n of intelligence espetially with, reference to inquiry;° orthe gelling of truth as a business; (2) the present (or past)hindrances to its free Nay, in the way of class interests; or.(3)f the present conditions in the railway, telegraph, etc., for

effectively securing th$ freedom of intelligence,.that is, itsmovement in the world of social fact; and.(4)' the resultingsocial organization. That is, with inquiry as a business, theselling of truth for money, the whole' would have a representa7

otiVe as well as the various classes,=-a representative whose--belly-interest, moreover, is identical WIth its truthinterest.

No I am crudely reducing what was a wonderful personal experi-ence to,a-crude bit ot cataloging, but I hope it may arouseyour interest in the can and his work.

The "Wonderful experience'. Dewey was referring to-in his arch way was a

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paper ofrord's entitl-d Draft of AttiOn.'1, Unfortunately, Dewey and Ford did10. ft

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.'"Draft of Action is available only at the Univeregy of Michigan'Llbrary. Allquotes, unless Otherwise noted, are taken from it.

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not help one anoEher get thin very clear and Ford's pope is as opaque as Dewey's-

letter. Nonetheless 'Ford's paper does'ex press in more extended fore ideas that.

.'ran fugitively through Dewey's writin gs, Moreover; Ford,.who.was semethi Ust

personalitir,.seems to }gave had influenc$ on G. H. Mead, Robert Park And Charles

Hortbn/CoOley ati,Well,as others he encountered at Ann Arbor.--

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Dewey. went ca to tel,Jamei that he-had gotten two things but of Ford's paper.

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First, "the true or piece Gel bearing of'ideali6m..." In Dewei's repdition idealism

was the dottrine.that-asserted-the vnity of intelligence and the_eiffiernal world, .

t' n4sublettftely in idea. If this unity were true, howeirer, it must-, then, secure the

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condition of its subjective expression. Second, Ford's paper suggested to him

this subjective unity was to become an objective part of the world:

I.believe that a tremendous movement is impending, when'theintellectual fOrces which have been gathering since tide

Renascense and.Refdtmetion,abill-eemand-compl4ta-frae-mavaw. Ant and, by getting their physical leverage in the telegraph

and printing press shall through free inquiry in a centralizedway, demand the amthority of all other authorities.

Dewey and Ford shared theiconviction that the growth of the telegraph overlaid

upon earlier.develoP nts in.puinting had Created the material basis fdr a national

socirkty." However, thig society was dormant as a 'spiritual, psychical, idealist

tealtty. For the emergence of a' national community out of a national society they. 7 r

looked to the union of modern' communications techdology (the material basis) with4

science (inquiry) as the agent ofaighared Intelligence. E"..orclqbared this hope

and '"Draft of*Action" was au' attempt to-present a practical,justification for the

Or -,aspiration. Now that space was eclipsed the opportunity was present:

The great extent of the United States% the bigness of the,country has compelled the elimination of distance. .But thiswas only to prepare the way for the organization of its in-telligence and the correlation therewith of the intelligenceof the whole world...Democracy in Aterica is not organizedtill we have consciously brought its intelligence to afenterand have related it to the past, that theltght might be had .

for the morrow's guidance. The means of communication are inplace but these could not be brought to the highest use untilthe realities flowing out from the locomotive and the'telegraph, their spiritual Meaning should be wrought put...

Dewey, at his most mystical, similarly suggested that "when the emotional

forde, the mystical force one might say of communication, of the miracle` of "ared. .

life and. shared experience is spontaneously-felt, the hardness and Crudeness of

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contemporary life will be b hed'in a ligpt that never was on land and sea."*

*John Dewey, Reconstruction in Philosophy, Boston, 1920,.p. 211.4

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Under Fbrd's influnce Dewey saw'the spiritual meaning of the new technology:

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It is no accident that the growing organizationhf democracy.coincided with the rise of, science including the machinery of

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telegraph and locomotive for distributing truth. There is +0

tbut one fact--the'more complete movem of man to his.unitywith his fellows through realizidg.the ruth of life.* _

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*John Dewey, "Christianity and..... _

. .r1132W pp.' 6768.

This advanCe in technology needed now the evolution of the newspaper and the

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development of the professional journalist to unleash a spirieUalized science and

a realized national community. According to Ford,

the daily newspaper holds the key to.future development...advances in the newspaper until now have been so many imiLprovements in the physical machinery which thf newspaper"uses...th'e newspaper has now at -its service a perfect work-ing machine, the printing press, the locomotive, the tele-graph and their,belongings....The advance movement renderedpossible by tbis discovery must in the nature of things bee sum of all previous advances beirr, nothing less than a

new ordering of intelligence. There comes in a change in thepower of thought--a forward movemen,in consciousness. Theneed has been set about organizing intelligence by the newlight; this to compel a prime movement in literature withthe daily newspaper as its)centre of motion.

Who was Frank4in Ford, this gat' inspiration to Dewey and otheri in the mid-

west, this visionary, who eafly on Saw. the radical potential in the new machihery

of communication?

Few details of Franklin Ford's life are known outside of hi s influence-on

Dewey. From 1880-81 he was editor of Bradstreet's newspaper-in New York. Brad -

street's Investigating Company was founded.as a mercantile information firm by

the enterprising Cincinnati.lawyer John M. Bradstreet in 1859. It was the fore-. .

runher of Dun and Bradstreet, created by a merger with R. G. Dun and Company in

1933. These mercantile credit reporting companies. were in certain respects the

first large scale, national cammerclal information services in the United States.

The.services started after the panic of 1837 and by the Civil War, Dun's had a

national system for gathe ring confident credit inf brmatioh with lawyers as

-"stringere in small western towns. The business rested on national organization,

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-high'spieed commurkcatiOn which made. Dun's a pioneer'in the Else of newscoalthiica.L\.-

tiods%teChhology, and, mpst important*, on unshakeable confide in the_truth-.

fulness of the information it provided. Sucti films had to be absolutely indepen-

4 ;.sYstem they seined. As we Shall see, t'ordfs exiierience as

an editor in this sytem shaped many of his ideas. concernifig the newspaper-of the

\1/4, future. -After.leaving Bradstreet's at the age of thirty-four, For, traveled widely

during the next year and a half and disclosed hiq futuristic -ideas with a .number . "f

of newspapermen and sfholars, most importantly with Dewey. These ideas are Olkid4.

.'in "Draft of Action," written at Ann Arbor "in 1892. After a stay of about nine

years in his home state 'Of Aptli!an, Ford married and returned to New York, where )

in 1897 he wrote a tract on the potential power of central cltaring houses for

bankfchecks. f¢ 1903 he restated many of his ideas about journalism in a treatise

on municipal-reform. It was in."Draft of Action," however, thatFord first pre-:IL

seated his vision of/a (evolution in the publishing industry luld of the conse-.

Auences inherent in theinew technologies of stearrn-power and telegraphy.*

' *Details of Ford's life are found in yhe Detroit Evening News, May 7, 160, p. 1.

John Dewey may have been most attracted to Franklin Ford because of -Ford's

remarkable foresight, or his ability to predict the consequences for society of

changes incommunications technology. In a later writing, for instance,,Ford

recognized. that theafeewlv created central clearing house for bank checks in. New

York had also itreated a new potential center of power over the nation's banking

firms. The. bank check had become a bill of exchange and thus followed trade and

communication. In an era when the main political battles were ovor-a. gold versus

a silver currency, Forditecognili4that the bank check and the ability to tele-

graph credit from city to city had destroyed gold as a carrieNtof credit and re-

placed-it with paper.* His "Diaft of Action" refits on a similar analysis of the

*The Country Check, New York, 1899.

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reorganization of .society begoadse of the telegraph and,tWiqocomotive. Ford's

proposal was fortthe creation of a scientific report-- scientific in the sense of. ' .

organization and connt. The results were to be sweeping. thus Ford-began-.

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trrarr Of' 4ale wifh this ileciaration:

The time has come when it will pay to act on the reality.un-'derlyingiLhe existing newspaper. The barriers down, i.e.,all anderancen to the free movement of intelligence removed,through the Completion of the machine for the gathering anddistributing (of) news,-(this machine consisting of the.printing press, t'he locomotive,' the telegraph and theirbelongings) the newspaper presentsairsell to-us as a unified'thingthe business of scaling intelligence. In this waythe journalist, hereafter the typical man of letters, comtskto havea definite position in life independent of all voca-tions, professions,,or trades. He hhs a commodity of hissoWn-=the truth.

With the "perfect working machine" for gathering and' distributing news in

hand, society had manly to await what Ford referrid to as "a change in the power

of thought a forward movement in co nsciousness." The exact nature of-this6

"movement" was most frequently stated, in a 7riety of organicist metaphors. At

one point'Ford desciibed this '" movement" as a new form of literature.. The mate-- 0

rial base of society had changed, he,declared, but "the social body is still ,

7-under the direction of pre - locomotive ideas."

The clear departure had to weit on the Amfrican'idee,--thethird fact of the century. The first fact of the centurywas the locomotive, the second the electric wire. The

, third is the spirituel outcome of these new physical agen4cies, or tT resulting conception oflife. Through the -

elimination of distance and its social rendering we havea flood of new ideas, making the new Anerican literature forwhich the'world has been waiting.'

Anew pdblishing buiiness-was compellad,kthe consequences of the locomotive and. S

. the telegraph. /he "spiritual recognition" of this-wad, inFord's scheme, to be

base4on the -principle of journalism as intelligence itself,- nhd of intelligence

as a commodity which one could sell in the marketplace. Ford's vision was toth

-,ological and commercial, ana.as such, entirely in tune with his times. Stated,

another way, Ford believed the outcome of the telegraph and railroad was'the full

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ciiculation of news throughoutthe'socialbody. Journalism itself was equated-.

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with the'"all-:embracing principle of intelligence" and, its quality was "determined .

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by the quicknesscand certainty of communication."*

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*'Municipal Reform; a Scientific Question, New York, 1903, p. 23.

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For someone possessed oi..a new and vibrant notion of news, Ford was remarkably

vague and unspecific as to what it was. Like many with a mission it was clearer

what he was against; what he was for'he took to be self-evident. He'opposed,-141,/,

particular, editorials as an "ineffective' form of preaching." With Robeflt Park he

felt that a "reporter with the facts was a more effectitv-e reformer than an editorial

writer thundering from the pulpit." Ile savaged the editorial page as a 'fort of

'church' maintained for the spurious man ofgolettet i.e., -for thedwriters asr

against the inquiry men, the reporters." The editorial was'sheltered behind

"certain notions as to its ethical value...," but they were utilized solely as a'

substitute for aaequate fact, for information.-

Ford opposed, as well, what he called personal intelligence--the cominis and

goingsiof particular people, social news:puffery, and what we'would' today call

'pAlic relations: ''the selling of two errors in Placeof one truth."

Ford most opposed in,the newspaper of hieday whht he called class interest.

Re meant something rather special by this phrasp' for he was in no conceivaIte

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sense a Marxist, socialist -or .even -a_ populist./ While-he ktaciced the class boas-'

of the news ansi the newspapef, he did not do so, in thename of the people or the-,

proletariat but in the name of a profession 40 was attempting to bring into exis -'

tence. Thet1890'swas a period in which a new elated was forming in American life.

ThisWas a time when theltajor profsdsional societies ilither bum into existence

or assUi Nd their modern character. The Cadres of experts which have long slnce

usurped effective control of modern institutions and bureaucracies-a-lawyers,,so-

4a1 workers, profesdional managers; engineers, accountants--were formed during

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this time intoiself-consciousness national groups represented bi kofessionlil so-,. .

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tittles and aware ottheir rDls^as-a neWclass leaditig social.reform. -ford was a,

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participant in this MOvemenOtglimpting.t. professionalize journallsts"by dawn---.

.4 ..,... '%..... 4,4strains theyxere linked to a cOmmon national mission, possessing a unique body

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of,knowled ge,,Inii *,,,-, i,.

'*o---1-f'li e,4%w .st ais.. dhe pr of. ession..hid wiled to em,erge..

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because it, and the newspaper, was tied to commercial and plutocratic elites and- ,

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ments.Preventedthe truth ftom emerging, though that was part of hie complaint.

He segued that'the newspaper reflected a structure of interests andleelings that

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. -',purposes and not t6 professional ones. Ford was

o not objeCtingto.the earning of% -

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profits from the news business; in-facto he felt he had foundsa way to meke,the,.. .

news business more profitable.. Nor was he suggesting that the-existing arrange-_

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*we're pretty much dictated by ik: xiating structure of commerce_. The newippper:., P .- 1. . .

disttibuted other people's facts, other pople's'opinione, other people's interest:

it at not cater to* its own interests as a oems(business no= did it present the f'

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sfacts as seen from the,peculiar perspective of the news organization. Alas, news -.

interests and news facts turn out,to be thoseof the society as a whole:,t

The men- of the physical commerce are 1110, far in possession or in -control df the newspaper- that the edge of inquiry is turned:, Ingreat part the Advertisers are editing the paiSer--that is inso-far as it iuedited atell. Not having discovered as yet thathe has a business of-hit own, throdgh possessing the commodityintelligtace,' the newspa er publisher is as let under the heelof class interest. ,

--This class-- interest was reflttted not merely in the ettection; excluSibe4

and play of news but, abOve 'ail, in the absence of ,a unifying principle 0 know-/ V

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papers were filled Oth unrelated matter.which was lack--.. ing'in general Interest; the generic thing, the life element

in news; wag ebsent. Merely individual- things had come to.hewidely mistaken for news. The newspaper was off the track,

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.was caught in its owrmachinTy. The physical advintel--betterprintinepfacilities, cheaper paper and the like--had outrun the

/spta movement. The only way out of the confusion,

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only way to new life and meaning, was through organizing intel- ,v.

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The task of journalism was thettginization. of, intelligence aid news but,1;=

lktelligence in so mething like theemilitary sense Ot.thit word'. SUch-intelligence

was, 'in turn, the body of knowledge of journalists which supported theirsprofes-.

sional .claim, .

and .the systematic gathering spell would trinsforrOournalists"from

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hired hands' to a professional class; indeed into the queen of the professions, if'p

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ihSt is -note too effeminate'ametaphor. Intelligence was *tithing other,thanctruth

4 and fact. Now all this iivopaque and circular.

Ford had little to say concern-

'ing thilepistemological and methOdo4tgiCal has alOterms. But in .

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"Draft of Action" hi did erect a model of echan for- the gather-

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.ing and disseminating of truth and factiApough it remained rather like telling

a miner bow to dig rather than instructing him on hoeito recognize gold. *1'. 4

Ford believed that truth was 'a commodity, `end thatAiishOuld be'sold. This

process of discovery and disilminatioU was called publicity: These terma.had°, - p

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none of the invidious cOnnotations sequently acquired. .A commodity II,

any substantial public object4something jectiVe. Publicity was a synonym for

communicition tethe most favorable sense of this term: 'knowledge of objects,

of the ohjective world made ely, publically Available. What was necessary, was. AR

`Xco Nnvincejournalisis the e trading-not in 14/vete, pers.() 1 and class, 4

-effluvia but in public inteil most widely shared, yeti icalknowledge.

that systematic inquiry could make available. and then to induce'them to construct. .

a profitable mechaniem to gather and disseminate it. , 'p

4111

.,

r ,Ford took his model of i telligence add organization, first from Brhdstreet's,

"the company that employed him a,d second, and most importantly; from allergenic

conciption of society'that the influence of Uerbert Spencer was very much

;kW vogUe In th'eA.ate,19th c

! .

IT,This nation-wide organii i of commercial credit. information implantsd the

]

germ fOr reforming journalism. Ilia only obj,ction to the system was that It was

t, \

redundant: there were two services ivailable--Dun and Bradstreet --where'only o. ,

0.........-

. ,''111 -

. .. s

414

13

yottto

%13.

was necessary. Moreover, Its 'Cope was too limited: he daily received requests,

from clients thathe limited scope of Bradstreet's operation prevented him-from. -

servicing. .Ford, said the idea for,the'new organization of journalism came to him

'wild he,..was at Bradstreet's:

I received oneday...a letter from a man of business asking' if he codd git a report on the acricpltural conditions andsitgation 'in A given bat of country in a western state. He

. had been askee-to have to dO'with building a railrod,throughthe region indicated and wanted the lay of the land. Thist._

inquiry could not be made as there was no fit machinery forthe purpose at, command...Other like inquiries coting to me, Iwas prompted to organize for such work -r to bring in an

e association,of experts. 'Getting no sympathy for of ideasfrom the executives of the Bradstreet Company, I saw more

' clearly than had previously been possible that the Bradstreetorganization and that of the mercantile agencies in generalcould an the whole only compass the gathering and sale ofrumor.

O

But the organization-gave him a model of truth and of the necessary commercialle&

independence of fturnalism. -Journalism must be as reliable as credit ratings,

as independent of commercial.pressure, and based onathe same order of facts.C

Facts--brute irreducible realities were'tbestuff of journalism: not opinions,

not interpretations,'not rumors or'fancies reported from others. Like credit

ratings it'had to be, gathered, systematized, and disseminated. $tit -like credit

ratings it would speak for itself, require no elaborate interpretation oredi-

torials to sp understanding or action. Today we would. say he was de-

daring the ptov f journalism too be that of social indicators: a universal,

objective fact'sertrice detailing thgretate of the social orgApism.. 7.

The last metaphor is deliberatelyosen, for Ford's system was held together. e

iy the evbcative'Power of the notion of syiet as an organism. In his view theA

"communications revolution"'had knit the cowl ry into a thorough4yiintegrated

system like the human body. All in needed.was a brain. ,As Dewey often. put it,

we were n the lap of an immense intelligence awaiting to be released. The re-.

lease would come when the dormant intelligence_was set,free by a spiritual.A

14

14.

organization parallel to the lAysical integration that already existed. Ford

compared the news service he was proposing to the arteries of the organisM, though

tb strictly parallel Sptncer, the arteries should bereserved for transport while

the nervous system was b'or communication. The press stands to.societY as the mind

does to the body. Critical-to this view is the belief that there is an order414

fact that describes the body and not merely the parts of it and, this description

is as unambiguous, actually as are biological counteYs. To demonstratethe.reach

of fact Forddeelared:.

' There is no more reason f confusion ,in political scien9ethan there is for tuo multiplication tables. rt is aquestion of the advance of inquiry, ofa further invasionof art.

. .

Fofd Olis not suggesting that newspaiers serve as vehicles for judgments

. .

. of politiCal scientists and sociologists.' He specifically warns h audience i

r ,

against writing about sociologists and recommenda instead the creation of ao

sociological newspaper: ,an independent statement of-the irreducible facts of

social life wedded to a systematic machinery of 4quiry.

]n 1892, Fo'rd saw that the railroad and telegraph had released a flood of

new ideas. New thinking had to follow upon these developments, in the form of

a new publishing industry, a unified codmerce, and even a new literary

consciousness.tt.

Ford argued that the sheer size of the United States compelled the1

elimination of distance as a first priority of politics. This was accomplish d,

though few seemed to recognize it, but it was only prelude. Now it was necess ry

. 1 ,

13

4

s.

15.

. ,

to organize the intglligence this physical conquest set free. 7o Oils end hef

projected Aew model of the news-busineas he called the,intelligence triangle'.)

1

,Its significance is.that it Was tag first clear proposal- for what we wouldenow

call a computer information utility, though projected at a touch simpler level` of

technology. To match 'the new physical dimensions of life h ,proposed an organi-

zat ion 'that would combine the wire services, a library and reference service,

daily and weekly newspapers, professional and .trade jour'n1s, and a mercantile

information-service intota'nationally integrated and differentiated monepolistic%

\..,- 44agensy.

:'7 organizailonwas based \.ipon'a s m e but-criticalaSsumption: while

. 4

. .dr .

there are but one set of facts that adequa ely describe the social organism each

fact in turn had three sides to,itior three interests pertaining to it:' individual,

.

clasp and whole. An event7-let us say a hail storm its Texas:--has three interests.

First, it affected the social whole-or people in their mostgeneral roles as

citizens and consumers. 'Tbe.hail storm has a general. effect upon the economy,. ,

the level'of prices in beef.jInd grain and a radiating-set of general consequences.

,Second, the hail storm has a clges significance to those engaged in theograin and

cattle trades: Produchrs;-farM-worker'e, cooperatives.- Third,' the storm has an

individual interest as well: the man thinking of buying' or Selling. some particular

fpiece of texaiddand or to purChase a commodity future. Three facts then from one

4

event- general, class and individualeach-at a diffeent level'of depth and*t .

generality.

The int nce triangle was designed to merge these three int ts in one

lower the, price of serving each. The interests Of the whole.;

)

organization and to

would be met by the News Assotiation centralized in 'New York though/41ianized. --

"throughout the nation on a county by county basii. The4News Association would

. own the major New York papers, a controlling share in papers in other majoir ci es4

and then,feed like a wire service the lesser papers. It would itself produce,' 0",

,

I

ow..

16.-

three daily papers: tba Newebook, a political paper reporting 'fully all significant'

events;.the'Town, a lesser daily reporting the alma faLs but aimed more at the

ordinary housewife and homeowner; and the Daily Writ containing all advertising

insofar as it is n sands personal items (classifiked'and self publicity).-g

-.0

TheNews Ass ciation would-then take the same facts and re1arket them on a

, class balis publishing journals such as Grain, Fruit, Politics, serving specializgdAP

professional and occupational,groups. Third it would then serve individuals by

,offeridg a library and reference 'service for thole who need to go beyond the first

two renderings. This third agency, which he cal4ed in an uncharacteristic fit Of

immodesty, "Fords""would'sery any individual nled for information,, even that of. :

the, disturbemind. They would 'apply at its counters for the reliemilg fact. The

great specialists in mental science would be found at its counters." Ford then

is the universal fact shop for individuals.

Three reports were derived -from one e'en -- general, class and individual;--1

dir each at a'different level of depth and generality, and each providing'a profit to

the organization. "The publishingbusiness,':,wTote Ford, "is the one industry

conducted on national lines which allows nearly all its by-products to go to waste:"*

*MuniriPil Reform, p. 21.

'The intelligaace triangle would remedy that. The News Association would re or_ .

r ,

.

.. ,, N

the general interestand feed other major newspapers like a wire service. The

Class News Ceinpany wOuldlke-market the strie facts in:itstrade journals while the

same facts were resold a third time to clients at the universal truth shops,

. .

b.*1offering Much the same as 'a.library reference service.

Ford's plan rested on something similar to the famousl cessful Penny Press

formula of "something for everyone." Only Fiord envisioned aYimnmensely more pea-

iteble formula of "everything for someone.".(Every person's interest would be

covered by the general, clue or personal services offered through the intelligence,

17. . f.511

. ,

17.-

trust. The organization would blanket the country witha news service integrated.

and made possible by the locomtiv,and telegraph; gathering every pignificant

piece of intelligence and re- selling it' to the different markets:-sk ,

Ford recognized that the existing wire serviced performed some of the

activities already but he argued against their ability:to provide an adequately.

integrated-service. "There cannot be:" ileassests, "two'centrea:,'one for gather-1.'

ing and distributing news, the other for printing it. The wire servitei were,

in short, obsolete. Thly competed'wftn%ope another, did not gatAthe full in-.

'1r

.telligence and did not servicethe class and, individual interests. The only

justificationof the AP was to pool and crivide the cost of news transmission}.

But this function had disappeared:, transmission costs were but a "bagatelle and

as therOp no longer Iny bar to communication a new principle of association is

demanded."

The key to Ford's prop9sal was that it would be a centralized national ser-

vice using New York As its base. It was therefore merely an extension"of the4 '

historic developMeht of communication traffic, thaughcjustified now by organic

metaphors. The trade'presswas wasteful, he thoug45, because it Vas not

centrally organized: 4tere was missing and overppped coverage and it offe

no service to the 'individual.,

Ford felt that the Tthydical equipment 447as in place to construct a gigantic

news and intel.hgenve machine phralleling' in the realm.of.knowledge the grid-like---

goverage And integratiOn of the .railroad and telegraph. Such a new organization0

would ren4,r the existing press obsolete and blanket the,nation with a Myer of. 1

intelligence matqApg the size\and structural diversity of the country.

The entire country would be divided into districts-for the collection of

news,' and-each Local 'fact would be dealt with in light'or'the whole, °Such an

authoritative, exchange of news must organize on "New York as'with ether lines of

trade, and a new centre is needed' to facilitate thekovement. Without concentration

I

h.e

I

on 16w York 4 wide exchange of information iSsimpoisilil,-

)

.

*Municipal Reform, p. 32.

%

The NewassOciation Would silkal as well thedeath ofthe.b

' 18.

ote Ford.*

4

e'

f literatureigenerally--for ibbse rms Tacked the speed, reach and faCtualnesa., )

,,.--,,.

of_ the newspaper. 'the took, in: dgew his fire:..

r . i1

.

At the dloars'ofthe N4ws Association this 4istinction betweenit,'journalism and literature bx%eivkm doOn. There' are no books-- .

there ire,onlynewsPapers--t4r4kare no newspapert-only'books.The prediction'ofthe Frenchman LamortLne that the ultimatebookwas to b'ettie new:gpapd r-,catnes.trUe.' Literature becomes.the recor4e4 movement qL2ide'aM-,of,lif(. That s;.the publish-

%IngIftsiness gets it's unit% throug1N'Oetec4onNifits proper°commodt(y--news,' The cOimmO4ity dasoWered 'the business ergs-.,

'nfzes...Under,thig'cboceptitm'eapb pub*ation,'newspaper,... . leafletor tobk-iie aiZe'ef theinewa.;, Nothings- put out

beyond leafiet size s-aveLiSpompelled, iiy;the%oluie tf Intel-ligence: No padded ttooks oi:papers wht-dt impressvolume and sn'to-.mike-flip kices 'ill` be issUpdpven.i n-,

; tej:ligence as p , ,,bdity,,,the trahmfeT 1%:Made:from the ;bookbusinpse.:X0 tAlk? ood§-busitess. _ Hlgh'riCes are. do ldnget .

.necessary to sUpportterary men,and -videas') -=aa of4he endow ="ment Printipli.'..Here IA, the:aigeFary..zeyolution. This ddt's

not'consimt'1,a'f'reprintioh'oldbookS it few kiteaobut in-selling new lntellitencelpsucholume a.ts 0 'coOpel.a reforming -

of publishing'methodav .

, ."

. I 4 V .

.HeraFord is., eniagedin.onehis most delicloue tasks an assault on.

.

ideasin the nams_of face,WolyeVhlowri hooks,in the home of news apers,:on lit- ,

. 1. .

.

'erature in the name of neitis,:prt aeifwpubitizing'aushorinthe,naga anonymous

4 . .

representative.inquiring reporters. -,The0

journalls; isthelpewI

eman of Letters-and..44

' ,

,, . -,

.. , ,- , a -

the news agency' displaces the Salon aed'uni4ereity. as the new agency of Otelli-...

.

gence: ariew Produptya new organization, a new profession. ,

. . ' ' 4 /. : e MVO

His attaciwas alio extended to competing newspapers and to the conCePt.Si ,..

.

. .,

. ,

... .

localism.. Re complains of cities like'New York and ChicagOuhere there are a-.,

,, 1 .

half dozen deliveries

.

of one ,fact: ,sik or sevea papers selling'

the same news.. ,

.

40, , aThis-competition, or, bett4F, duplication cane about

-. .

.

when the difficulty of getting at the factthe whole trutb-=put a piemidi op opinion.' Uith.distance gone the access tofact'is complete. In this light theauperfluousedailypages 4

A

; -.o .

in. the "leading cities are seen to be surViVala from the age.of opinionthey are medieval: .Their ditsplacement,only waltaupon the centralized actin.

.. - 4 ,

... :,

,Mortover the newspapers are to be freed from local m6Orings, 'There is no

19.

l

strictlfc 'unity interetilt:,'only national,'class and'tndividual interests.

what is gathered locally as newsYit'Oo be reported from fr standpoint'Therefore

".

,

of, those tripartite interests and not t the factsmean for; let us say, Chicago1

Oba

_ ,

or the co iiies wtthin the cit. As the reporters of the news association draw. .

their pa from the tentrO. off ice they are "freed from the control of local'preju-

dic1(.' e local.fact is everywhere dealt with in the light of the Whole thus

Icompll,ing the highest .sensations."

. . -

4111t I'This highly centralized, +grated, 4fTerentiated news system would,be open, )

./01

Ford realized, to the charge of monopoly but he readily dismissed it. The news

organization, he declared, would demand new concepts of jurisprudence. They were

. .

not M6nopolizing the truth; they were gathering it'and disseminating it. No new

business could charge the trust with monopoly for an additional n wS agency was

merely redundant:- to do twice w t was already being done once. There were'no110

shades orNiniod to be represented, only facts which when in the possession of

4.

all; would command commodthought and judgment. Opinion was medieval, obviated by

the new te chnology whici) by conquering space and time put everyone in the same

relation to the, same facts and compelled agreement. The new era allowed for%..an

to thg.notionof cheeks and balances--the essential of the cowetitive doc-A"4.

.tr ne--as a justification for freedom of the preap. This is the'.1ast of checks

')alances he thundered, the end of CalhOunism." The social system, echoing

Spencer, provided its awn balance. The principle oE the grand division of labor

meets- the last behest of Carlyle: "How in conjunction with inevitable democracy

in4spensable sovereignty is to exist." Al4s, the newspaper is a naturals

, mondpoly.

20

. The final vupporting pillar of F2r(s- proposal was status fot the

reporter himself. The reporter or as Ford renamed'hiMe the 'diurnal man," held

the central position in his scheme. This new status was part of the bureaucratic

20.

;thouet and organization sweeping the fields of law, medicine, management and edu-

cation do the 1890's. Ford sought to profebsionalize jouinSlists by demonstrating

r7they.yere linked to a,common national mission, in possession of a unique body of.

. . , . ...,

kn e, and worthy of a new respect. The reporter now had his own commodity:..

.

the truth. He was to be the "diurnalist," the replacement for the typical man of \, .

/

The position of the reporter in Ford's scheme pot is to the second sense in

whith the ieport would.be ."scientific," its content. The reporter would be'in

league with the university scholar. :The,scientific inquiry conducted in univir-

sides could find disdemination through lournallga. The result would free the

-scholar to scientifically-Study tHe phiTsiology of the state, and free the reporter

to convey the truth about social.organization.

The image of the reporter as "diurnal man" which one finds in Ford's writing

is heroic. The reporter stands above the social organism, one hand reaching out

tothe scientists'or "inquiry men" of the uPiities_.,_tilleLother hand possessing ,.

the communications technology necessary to transmit the facts. Ford's writing is

saturated with organic metaphors owing, a debt tb Herbert Spencer and to the

"d"ynamic sociology" of Lester Frank Ward.- In proposing a link between the daily6

newspaper and the university, Ford reached the pinnacle in o,yganicism. "Developed

to the full on the inquiry side, the university becomes a Center of action. The

university is at on eL ;41.th science, with commartewhich is everywhere becoming

r--scientific. The university is then a ganglion in tie nervous system of the state."

21

,

The metaphorof-the nervous system is thoroughly appropriate to the scientific

vision of the report and presages the use of the computer in today's "precision"'

(journalism. Th newspaper wduld provide the univergitacwith An avenue to the out--

21.

side world, with.daily contact. And theuniversity would provide the newspaper

.withscientific inquiry, essential to reporting the state of the social body. The

newspaper- uK!versity cooperation would be the central exch&lge'for intelligence.

Together they would rest atop.the social organism as a head in,relition to the body.

This "ginglian" of the newspaper- university link represented his hopes for

a centralizing organization "for the country and the world."*

*Municipal Reform, p. 32.

But in this plan.thpet lurked the same, imperialism and nativism that was most4 I

always and everywhere the counter-currency of the humane aspiraWns of the "90's."

In conclusion Ford summoned up the image of the Ang1O-Saxon hegeMony wkkli made

mockery of he unity found in the philosophy of organicism:

G at significance is bound up A the fact that it is English

+31

a aking men who are to bring in intelligence to a centre andd tribute it. In this is Ifinally certified the per restingin the hands,of England and the United States jointly.Mr. Gladstone writillrof the English and American people said:

'They with their vast range of uninhabited territory andtheir unity of tongue are msster's of the world, whichwill have to do as they do.

/ 1

Ford's proposals have never quite'taken root in American communicati in the

form they proposed. Yet they have mirrored a general pattern of development and a

general motive as well. In recent proposals e development ofell'Oh

modern communi-

cations technology his ideas are more or less faithfully re-echoed. But the

determining notions since the 1890's were th'ere in embryo: the need for natirally

integrated communications, for a journalist pistemology based upon the sanctity

of the fact, a'naive faith that sgared information dissolves social disagreement,

2 7

00"*--

a

4 4 12.

that piinion is medieval, that commercSwill provide the model of hUman communi-.

Cation, and that technology and scienceirethedtwin solventsofour 04fficulties.

The Literary Rlport.

In contrast to For expert reporter or "diurn 1 n,!' the literary journal*_ 4

I

taw seen as "vernacular ," the observer of local ffilcS who was in tune witholt

the common sense and logic of the small town or neigfOrhood. Literary critics

fetit was impossible for the benefits of steam-power,adcf electrictty to suspend

-%- ' 4,

in solution all of the diverse interests and conflicts-of the small towns and the

myriad Mien enclaves of custom and tradition existing within the metropolis. In

fact, a deep suspicion of the telegraph and railroad'elcisted among this group.

Critics of the newspaper who believed in the literary dtyle of reporting developed

an argument partly based on aNnsw nervous disease known as neurasthenia. Most ex-

$i of this criticism in the late nineteenth centurywere, of course, mainly

addressed against the'sensational'fournals of the,day rather than to anything re-!

sembling Franklin Ford's ideas. But different perspectives nelilttheless emerged

froi the literary style of reporting when it came to the sanctity of the fact,

the historic centralization of communications, and the ultia effects of the

telegraph and.steam-power on the human system and upon literature.

Central to the literary criticism of the newspaper was, the work of George

Miller Beard, a post-Civil 'Vier medical researcher who specialized ip diseases of

the nervous system. From the beginning-of his career in 184,until his death in

1882 he published several books and articles on the effects of electricity and

stSSmr-power_on the human organism. Like anyone with an explanatory idea, Beard

had disciples and-detractors. One cohtdEporary neuro - anatomist, while acknowledg-

ing Beard's influence, called' him "a kind of Barnum of American medicine." But

. within a couple yearslof publication of his most influential work, American

23'4

t

`a-

23.

'Nervousness (1681), speakers at medical convent/ions and press. critics alike were-.

! . v . ,

claiming that the organization of modern society!ociety base on steam - power, the tele-

graph,.and,the periodical presi was "undoubtedly" the cause of an increase in -ner-'

vous diseas47 According to a medical historian, Beard was one of the first to

r-

recognize that the demands' made by goiciety upon, the individual might be an eSsen-

tial factor in mental illness, and thus was in a sense a forerunner of Freud.*

*Charles E. Rosenberg, "Introduction," American Nervousness (Arno Press, 1972),'also in "The Place of George M. Beard in Nineteenth-Century Psychiatry,"Bulletin.of the History of Medicine, 36 (1962),p. 245-59.

Beard's critique of modern society was clear, but his conclusionsiwere ambiva-

lent. "Thechief and primary causeof this development and very rapid increase of

nervousness, is modern civilization," he wrote, "which is distinguished from the

ancient by these five characteristics: steampower, the periodical press, the tele-

grdph,'the sciences, and(the mental activity bf women. "* Nervous exhaustiorn;was

*American Nervousness,. p. v.

4most prevalent in the north and east portions of the United States because the

character-1st ies-af -modern society were more- highly -developed there than- anywhere,

else in the world. Modern nervousness wasblamed on man's dependence on clocks

and watches and a precise sense of time, the intensified competition fostered by

the telegra h, the noise of civilization, the "unpleasant sensations" caused by

-railway tr 1, the multiplied burdens of business, the tensions in Protestantism,

the habit of forethought and the shrinking size of.the-irdild. "The discovery of

9

America, like the invention of printing, - prepared the way for modern nervousness; -

and, in connection with the telegraph, the railway, and the periodical press in-

creased a hundred-fold the distress of humanity," Beard wrote.* Despite this

*American Nervousness, p. 133.

24,

_s

F

F

I

.

damning indictment Of the"modern world, Beard felt the weakening of the nery

e I

."2471

e

. force, over - sensitiveness and excitability characteristic of nervousness would'in4

,the long run contribute to increased longevity. Everywhere the greatest- geniuses,

AP'were the most susceptible to nervousness but alio the longest -lived creatures, he

thought, and thus,the United States was destined to become the greatest of nations.

Beard's diagnosis of. this Malaise influenced,expression in several Arenas.

Some writers who were arguing the relative merits of the country over the city.

found nervousness to be a malignant outgrowth of city living. Much literary

Criticism of journalism in periodfal journals, although tied to the traditions

and concerns of the 018 World and to.the elite culture of New England; held one

belief in common with the scientific camp: steam -power and the telegraph had

rearranged the foundations of society. One.wTiter arguedthat facts were not the

pure,impartial data envisioned by Franklin Ford, "for behind every fact lies a

moral no less than an intellectual cause." Others accused contemporary publications

of transforming journalism from the periodical expression of thought into an agency0

for collecting trivialities, or claimed the newspaper report and telegraph were

, producing a hasty and shallow account ofthe world.* More important for our

I. l'r''

*See, for example, "Voices of Power, Atlantic Monthly 53 (18841, p. 177;Atlantid Monthly 68 (1891), p..689-90; The Specrator.(London) 63 (1889)p. 631-32. Similar articles were published in McClure's, The Forum, andChamber's Journal of Popular Literature (Edinburgh).

purposes was the direct application of Beard's ideas to criticism of the newspaper

report. ,

Charles Dudley Warner was the earliest newspaper critic to use Beard's ideas.

Warner in 1873 had co- authored with Mark Twain The Girded Age, a'novel which lent

its name to an era. Earlier, Warner had written two long series of editorials for

the Hartford Courant, later republished as books. His style of writing evoked the

25

- 4 V

. . -,-,

. 74IW

. ..

C ,b) .. . * .. lv 25.- - , -4

.. 4 .. "t-. ,

.

pleasures of rural life ands the'enjoyment of familiar thigs. His watletevealed. !, , .% , 1. .

. %

77 the diverse interest's oca catholic mind.' It ..7asea 4'kind of writing that. suggests -

conversation aid music and friendly intertuptions. "* Certainly Warner's style was

of, .. ..

.......27,11:1

\., / ,

s,

.. *Mrs. James T. Fieldsi.Charlea Dudley 1'arAF, (New York, MdClure, Phillips Co.,1904),p. 35.

li.

,

. :

align to the factual,scientifiio crop-reporting kind of'jouranlism advocated by

.

Franklin Ford.,

In a remarkable address on "The American Fewspaper" delivered to the Sod-Jai

Science Association in 1881, Uarner admitted,.his dismay at the foss of a common

4'Sense literary quality in'the press, a development he blamed on the technological

organization of the newspaper. "Editorial discrimination,'"he said, "hhs mot kept

pace with the ,facilities. ITe are overpowered4with a mass of undigested intent-,

, ..,

gence, colleted, for the most part, without regard to value." Many, newspapers .

i

had become nothing more than "d sort of waste-basket at the endeola telegraph

.-j1W.wire." This maaiine for collecting news was be%hd management, and was, perhaps,

contributing to the unfortunate mental disease of modern man. In a long but'

striking paragraph, Warner echoed Beard's recently published arguments:

The characteristic of our moderncivilization is sensitiveness,or, as the doctors say,'neryousness. Perhaps the philanthro-pigts would term it Sympathy. No doubt an exciting cause...43f itis the adaptation of electricity to the transmission of facts yand ideas. The telegraph we say has, put us in sympathy with'all the world. And We reckon this enlargement of nerve contactsomehow a gain, Our bared nerves are played upon by a thousandwires. Nature no doubt has a method of hardening or deadening

these shoCks, but nevertheless every person who readsis'a focus for the, excitements, the ills, the troubles of all theworlod. In addition to his local pleasures and annoyances, he is

"c in a manner compellea to-'be a sharer in the unixersal uneaainess.It might be worth while to inquire what effect this excitingaccumulation of the news of the world upon an individual or acommunity has upon happiness and up:on character. Is the NewEngland man any better able to bear or deal with his extra- .

or dinaryclim'atleby the daily knowledge of the weather all overOF

11

it

*44

I

.

.11

1.

* "-The American Newspaper, "-American Social Science Association, 14 (1881) 62.

--Albo published es The American,NewsPaper, (Boston, James R. OsgoOd & Co."1881).

the..globe? Is a an happier or improved in character by the 4p'weful tale'of a world's distress and apprehension that greetshim every morning at breakfagt?*. ,.

.4.

26.

......:4-;Jk

,..y .

Here Warner hash expressed a concern. ffir the integrity of local condit.

questidned

such things

writings of

produced by

and has

the worth of centalized national, and iniernatidna4"-co ication.. Are

even Word; knowing, he asked. Such-second thoughts never enter d the-.

. .

Franklin Fbrd.' Warner was 4111t questioning the veracity of the r

41111

orts

'thewrganiied machine .0 intelligence. Rather lieNquetionea'the ex-.

perpe in human and community terms ofa preoccupation with facts and the destrucflot

0 distance achieved by the telegraph.

iSi;lattf these literary'cOmplaints have about them the sound of despair

a passing age, as 'does the modern c that there is no.17;good news" in the pdper.

Exabination of such comments, however, often reveals an emtWely different philos-

ophy of what the repoit should-be, that is, apersonal or literary,account of fife

NOrather than the cold, °factual images of the,sitientific report. The literary argu-

ments presented an Alternative:Pefpegtive on journaliss.., These aiguments denied. .

. . -

fhae fact was superihr'h opinion. anti interpretation, preferted local understand-

ings to nationalO5panization, ane:decried the effects of ateem-power aid telegraphy....

, .

,rWNriv'

. la °

on communities aglindividuals.ti w

Finally,7the argument centered on-the gontent of tlie report. Charles Duey)k, .

Warner felt rnalim, mudt walk a,fine line between literature and common sense.

, ar. ..

. Tge4eport "duseghaye7son thing of the charm of the e-one [literature] and the-../x

sagacity of t he othr [commk1 sehse], or it will fail to please,"*.

. .

,

..

.

. . -,

. .

4

-*"The AMeric'an NeApaper,

/

4

. 57.111;

4

4'

tie,f4 t

,"-,

0.. I

.

,

Benjamin Franklin, with his wide ranging curiosity and ability'to communicate

27.

"came as near as anyone everodidmo marrying ,commpn-sen-se-iii-iiterature," Warner, .

thought, 'le was what somebody said Carlyle was, apd who the American editor

ought to be, a vernacular man."9

The repo r as "vernacular tan," tied to the culture, ehe.language and theisa

people of a particular region, presents'certain contrasts to the conception of the

"diurnal man" suggested by Franklin Fordo and 'later developed 'by 'John Dewey. These

contraatsoffer us a clue to the tensions and incompatibilities in the scirentific-.

"ideal of the repoit. The kind-of literary report revered by Warner appeared out-

moded in the rapidly changing society of the 190's. The scientific report, however,

was itself of limited value to society. Ford, for instance, found it neces ryto

constantly Proclaim his "diurnal man" as the replacement for the typical man of

letters, thus unintentionally revealing that the literary apile could not be casually

abandoned. The scientific and liteiary styles are'frequently complimentary, and,

attempts to eliminate one or the other merely result in'uncovering particular weak-

a

neaSea ildlerlmit-in an unbalanced approach to the organization of communication..

,_-

-a*,. ,:.

2

s_

The Chicago ScAO1s

7-,

a.

,

:.-Few attempts have been'made nihis centUilsto intellectually wed the scitn-,

tific and'the literary perspectives on journalism. Ones such effort--which'can only

""":22r

11° b8 briefly touched upon here--was made oVer!a period-of roughly twenty years by the

scholars of the Chicago School of Social Thought. No other intellectual standpoint

has accorded such importance to the role of the newspaper in society. Philosopher

and social-thinker John Dewey paved the way with his investigations of the nationalA

society in the 1920's. Robert Park, a newspaperman and sociologist, examined i4 -Pa

the 1930's the literary quality of the human interest story and the critical. posi-%

-'tion of journalism in modern society. The attempt to incorporate both the literary

-

S.

. . 28.

iFand scientific modes of thought in their reconceptualizatione Jour alismeitinds

as one of the unique achievements of the Chicag School.*

*

40. ,

*Park, Dewey, S1. Thomas_and George Herb t read all wrote on aspects of newsand Journaliam. See for example Dewe Public'and Its Problems (1927), Park's"Natural Hibtoiy of the Newsliaper," News as a Form of Knowledge," and The

. Immigrant Press. Thomas.used the newspaper as source material in his monumentalThe Polish Peasant; see also "Leadership,.Educatipn,and the Press." Mead wroteon "The Nature of Aesthetic Experience;" whicti also investigated the natale ornews.

Franklin Ford directly influenced John Dewey's thinking. The two men'first

met in the 1890's while Dewey was leaching at the University of Nichigan. Ford had

carried his ideas for a scientific organization of tntelligence to a half dozen

EastCoast universities. He compared his cold reception to that of Sir Henry

Bessemer had he attempted to introduce the iron industry to the new chemistry of

steel. Dewey listened eagerly, however, and Ford stayed on to write his "Draft of

Action." That Dewey was deeply touchLd by Ford's line of thought40111

is evidenk not

only from his later writings, but by his own admission.

;

" Nearly forty years after their initial encounter, Dewey restated Ford's main

thesis in The Public, and Its Problems (1927). Dewey added, however, a concern for

the integrity of.coMmunities and neighborhOOds that was more characteristic of the

literary perspective.

-"A Genuine Social Science.4'

Instead of beginning.with the prediction .of the reorganization of society.

based on the new technologies; 1:1eWey had the advantage of looking backward in title

at the demise of the small-town community. What he sat., in retrospect was not sim

ply a physicarbreakdown bf social relations. It was also a problem of access to

knowledge anda ppblem of communication of social inquiry. He perceived the4-

.

,OW.

r

intellectual brakdown of the small-town. Professionals and intejlectuals

.

in-

fields such as medicine, law, econbmics, teaching, administration and even in

4buiinpss and agriculture, using long lines of communication set by the telegraph

and railroad, had abdndoned local, vertical social relationships:in favor,of

horizontal professional ties on a national scale.* They identified with other ,

*See Robert Wiebe, The Search For Order (1967).

. ,

exptrts-on a national level rather than locally with their neighbors in a range_ 0 4.

a

of ocdtpational and social groups. Part of the social change of he 1890's and-. , IP

beyond was the result of this professionalization of intellect and expertise. The

breakdown of ihe commippitydWhich Dewey, so regretted was directly affected by the

exclusion of the public from the knowledge it needed to understand the consequences

,

of action. Problems were not conceived of nationally and-the solutiOns demanded

,

combined intelligence. Local knowledge no longer sufficed. Yet the general pub-

lifrand the local community Were, as Dewey paid, excluded from the "lap ofc_intel-.

ligence" which had made the small-town community a competenf'and viable social

41/1 organization. Here Dewey was being pulled in two direstions by his attachments

tojthe Midwestern small town and to the promise of,a national*, integrated

communication system. JSeeking a teinttgration of social relations, Dewey restated Ford's principal

ideas. The essential prereqUisites for the emergence of the public and the com-

*enmity were two: udnt social science" or free social'inquiry, and a "full10

and moving communication that knowledge to the society at-large.

Dewey recognized as did. Ford before him that the university'scholar had

d'efected frocsociety. Scientists and experts capable of conducting a "genuine

- socialscitnce" were blocked from participation in the common life of the community.

-They Mood behind a Scientific inquiry which had been casein a "highly specialized

30.

,

language" and remained "a Mystery in the hands of initiates'," accordihg to Dewey.

Hence the pliplic.was eclipsed by its exclusion from social knowledge. The first

11 order,otibusiness, then, was to pry scientists out of their isolated'

ttion and transform them into a group dedicated to the conscious build

1 ,

',t, amunity knowledge. Their' knowledge required cyculatien. Dewey, like

the daily newspaper as, e mediumbetweent.these "inquiry men" and the

"So accustomed ate we to [the sensational] method of collecting

and presenting social changes," wrote' Dewey,.-' it may well sound

say that a genuine social science would manifest its reality in'the d

social posi-

ing of com-'

Ford, Proposed

community.

, recording

ridiculous to

aily/Press-,

while learned books and articles supply and polish tools of inquiry.' But tte inr

quiry.which alone can furnish knowledge as a precondition of public judgments must

be contempOrary and quotidian. Even if social sciences as a specialized apparatus

of inquiry,were more advanced than they are, they would. be comparatively impotent

in the office of directing opinion on matters of concern to the public asjohg as

they art remote from-aPOlipition in the daily and unremitting assembly'and

pretation of 'news.'"* In many ways, this is an echo of Ford's "forward ement

*Public and Its Problems, p. 180 -81.

.

of consciousness," whfch'would put "every expert...at the end of a wire.''* The

*Hunicipal Reform, p. 21-22:

. news report would not,only be scientifically" collected, its very substance would

be "science."

Dewey was well aware his proposal called for a "kind of knowledge and ineight"4b

which did.not yet exist. He was also aware his proposal put him in. pomething of a

dilemma. But manyof4he tensions in his ideas surface only.when looked at from

I

31

°

31.

the perspective of the debate between the literary and scientific report and the

implications of each. Dewey hoped to combillehe more desirable aspects of each.

-. mode of thoUght and to discard the weaknesses. The dilemma he encountered, hOWever,

was characteristic of a number of progressive thinkers. His proposals fell apart

if shared information did not dissolve social disagreement if nationally integrated

colmunication wad not compatible with competent local Communitied, or if the monvo-

.4.

Iy of knowledge-held by experts was nOt to be easily dissolved by a 'collaboration

ft

-with a professional, journalistic class. The result -- which was a prime fear of

1

the literary perspective on journalism.-- might be an ever increasinglgap between. .

4,

-Imo`

ordinary people with ihiir experiential wisdom, and a specialized r per f I-

... . ,, , . ,W.

scientific knowledge."

too * .

To Robert E. Park fell.the tasi, of trying to reconcile this tension 'between

the scientific and literary report. While still at the University of nichigan,'

John DeWey had introduced 'Franklin Ford to Park, thenan ambitious Tiewspaperman.4

it 1. -

Id his "dAutobiographical Note," Park said it was at about that' time "the newspaper

and news .6ecame'My problem."*

, AP.A*gaceancreillture, p. v.

-

.'The direct influence,

ot Franklin Ford was recognized by Park himself, but it

is not as obvioug in his writings as it was in Dewey's. Ford's terms pop up occat;-

-sionally in Park ls articles. Ford referred-to the "natural'history" bf governmenti

,and of news reporting in hiss19 3' treatise, Municipar'Reform. Park later wrote a

411010

famous article titled "The Natural.History of the Newspaper" (1923), and the natural

history idea grew:into_an entire schdol of urban studies.

t'Park viewed.the history of the newspaper as,the development and survivl of

a social institution, not awe product-consciously created by far - seeing publishers

and editors. Thus, he directed his attention to the nature of the institution and

the nature of newd itself.

32

1

In "Yews as a.Form of'Knowledge," Park describes two kinds of knowledge \

which roughly correspond to what we have here called literary and scientific per-.0.

spectives, thoUgh his Otos come from William James. Acquaintance with" ls the

knOwledge one acquires from personal and fit'sthand encounters with the world a nd

life. It is "our knowledge of other persons and human nature.' The other kind is

. "knowledge about." That is the logical, philosophical gniglitientifi't kind of

knowledge gained by substituting words, concepts, and a logical order for the datu-,

ral course of, events. "Flowledge abbout," he said, was easily communicated and wasf

likely to be found in the newspaper. -But-"acquaptance with," if it gotcommuni-,

cated at all,'wouid be found in the form of pradtical maxims and wise saws rathet

than as scientific hypothests. ''Nevertheless,. Park declared, aWide and intimate

acquaintance with men and'things is likely to be the bulwark of most sound judgment

,in practical matters as well as the source of those hunches upon which experts de-

pend in perplexing situations and of'those sudden insights which, in the evolution

of science, so frequently the prelude to important discoveries."*

*Social Control Ad Collective, Behavior, p. 36.

Park appropriately became concerned with how and why the human interest story--

f' the most'direct attempt.at communicating the "acquaintance with" or literary kind

of knowledgegrew to play such an important role in the presentation of news. HisA

primary interest was in its function.as a replacement for village and small-town

social processes. The newspaper was senulak modern society as a guide to manners

and-life. That function was normally handled by gossip, personal contact and tradi-

tion. Thus, Park frequently looked upon the newspaper, through its use of the human

interest story, as a form of art and literature.

His investigation of news as literature and art is one of the rare attempts.

in American intellectual history when a serious scholar tried.tQ.xelate the newspapera -

33

O

10

33.

. to the primary processes, of social organization.' But-Park did not sucCedi in inte-

grating the ideal of the oldcommunity.and the literary style wit the conception 1

of news as science.' There still remains.a fundamental split between the human in-

Merest element it news\and the dissemination of science through the pages of the

newspaper and magazine. It is a conflict dating from the age pf the telegraph.

The reaction to the anew" journalism of the.1960's provides a measure of the

degree to which this long-standing historical debate has been forgotten or neglected.

In the 1960's, the "new" lOurhslisM reintroduced literary consciousness. The

-debate over ,the "new" versus the 'precision" )ournalismpas.r.been carried out ih

terms similar to.the debate between the 'vernacular man' and the "diurnalist,"4

Even the extended biological metaphors of AYshall UcLuhan reopened the'issue of

the electric: disease of nervousness. The "new" jourrialisd of the,1960's waSaireeted

as radical. But in terms of scientific and literary styles c& reporting, the "new"

journalism is a development akin to the conservative reaction tothe effects of ttle

telegkaph-whith we have seen otturting.sinte the 1390's.

, 34 S

11.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

FRANKLIN FORD

Known Publications of Franklin Ford:

"Eleven delusive methods of municipal financiering," New York, 1879.*

"The industrial interests, of Newark, N.j., containing an historical sketch ofthe city..." New York, Van Arsdale & Co., 1874.*

-AP

"Mayor Edson's charter and the democrat4principle..." New York, 1883.*

34.

*Listed in the Union Catalog, V. 177, under William F. Ford, which, was FranklinFord's full Christian Wame.

"Draft of Action," Ann Arbor, 1892.

"The. Country Check,...action Of the New York banks and its real import," New York,"Fords" 1899.

"Municipal Reform -- reports on the New York-City DepartMent'of Finance," orMunicipal Reform, a Scientific Question, (19D3)

-"Christian Science Boardedefying Mrs. Eddy's By-Laws," signed letter to the NewYork Times and other,papers, Jan. 10, 1927. This is probably not the sameFranklin Ford. He would have been about 73 yeats old at the time.

1

Other articles containing information about Franklin Ford:

"Miss Coffin, and Mr. Ford," The [Detroit] Eveningv' Neva, May 7, 1897, p. 1. Thisis a story about Ford's marriage which rated page one treatment. Containsseveral biographical details and a picture of Ford.

Perry, Ralph Barton, The Thought aneNCtaracter of William James', (Boston, 1935).Vol. II, p. 517-19, letter from John Dewey to William James.

Ratner, Sidney and Jules Altman, John Dewey and Arthur F. Bentley, 'a-PhilosophicalCorrespondence, 1932-51. (1964) Introduction, p. 9, mentions-Ford and theidea for the "Thought News.'

Dykhuizen, George, The Life and Mind of John Dewey (1973), more information onFord and the "Thought News" project of 1892.

ark, Robert Ezra, Race,r4 Culture. "An Autobiographical Note;-",p.

Belmont", Lary, "Robert Ezra Park: An Intellectual Portrait of a Journalist andCommunications Scholar." Journalism History, Winter 1975-76, Vol. II, No. 4.

THE LITERARY REPORT

George Miller Bead:

435.

Beard, American Nervousness, New York,,1881. Ch. 3 especially.

Beard, "American Nervousness: Its Philosophy and Treatment," Quarterly Journalof Science 16(Sept. 1879), p. 598-610. Abstract of an address to theBaltimore Medical and Surgical Society.

Beards "Consolation for the Nervous," Appleton's Journal, 5 (1878) p..369-73.

41.

Rosenberg, Charles E., "The Place of George M. Beard in Nineteenth- CenturyPsychiatry," Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 36 (1962), p. 245-59. AlsoIntroduction to 1972 Arnd Press edition of Beard's American NervoSsnea.

"Nerves and Nervousneii," Spectator 72 (Jan. 6, 1894), p.11-12.

Peckham, Grace, M.D., "The Nervousness of Americans," Journal of Social Science,22 (June- 1887), p: 37 -49.

11....-.

lbutt, T. Clifford, "Nervous Diseases and Modern Life," Conte9poarTReview(London), 67 (1895), p., 210-31.

Lyman, Henry M.p. 81-82.

"Nervous Disorders in Ameripa," Dial (Chicago) 2 (Aug. 1881),Review of Beard's American Nervousness.

Dr. Bilsinger, "'Modern Nervousness and Its Cure," Popular Science 42 (Nov. 1892)0% 90-93.

"Nervousness," Chamber's Journal 50 (1813), p. '429 -30.

Wakefield, Edw2 (Feb". 189

"Nervousness: the National Disease of America," McClure's. 'p. 302-07.

The spaper and Telegraph:f'

"News," Chamber's Journal-(Edinburg4) 38 (Oct. 11, 1'862), p. 225-27..

Brooks, Noah, "The Newspaper of the Future, "The Forum 9 (July p. 569-78.Brooks favors the scientific report.

Frothingham, 0.B., "Voices of Power," Atlantic Montilly'53 (Feb. 1884), p. 170-82.

"Our Special Wirer" Chamber's Journal, set. 4, vol. 5 (July 11, 1868), p. 4S3-36.Report of the destruction of distance by the telegraph.

"The Intellectual Effects of1889)'p. 631-32.

Stillman,' W. J.; "Journalismp. 687-95.

-;

Electricity," The Spectator (London)

and Literature," Atlantic Monthly 68

36

63 (Nov. 9,

(Nov. 1891)

t

Olt

/36.

';The Influepce of the press," The Spectator 83 (Nov: 25, 1899), p. 776-77.

Fallen, Conde Benoist, Newspaperism," Lippincott's Monthly 38'-(Nov. 1886)p. 470-77.

4

"The Curse of Print -- A Lay Sermon,"'Catholic World 41 (1885), p. 395-408.1/4

Ward, Reir. Julius H., "The Future of Sunday Journalism," Forum 1 (1886) p. 389 -98.

Charles iDudleyWarner:

Warner, "The American Newspaper," American Social Science Association, vol. 14(1881), p. 52-70. Also published inhook form as The American Newspaper(Boston, JaMea R. Osgood &Co., 1881). -

Fields, $rs. James T., Charles Dudley Warner, (New York, McClure, Ybillips & Co.,1904).

JOHN DEWEY

Dewey, The Publie,and Its Problems, (1927)

Dewey, Individualism Old and New, (19-29)

'Carey, James, "Canadian Communications Theory: Exrensiads and Interpretationsof'Harold Innis,"_ from Studies in Canadian ications, Gertrude JochRobinson and Donald 11.JTheal/ (eds.), 1975, p. -59.

Dewey, Outlines of a Critical Theory of Ethics.

Dewey, Reconstruction in Philosophy, Bostonv,1920.

Dewe/, "Christianity and Democracy,'' ReligiOus Thought at Mangan, Ann Arbor,1920.

.6/

37